h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

And worse (sorry) when one of the participants is supposed to be in loco parentis to the other.

Actually, though, re Bowie et al, at this distance I'd be inclined to say that it depends how those then 13 year olds view what happened. If they are ok with it then fine. But if they feel abused, then they were because, no, I'm not sure that a 13 year old is able to give informed consent in the circumstances that the encounters must have happened. I don't care if it was the prevailing culture.

Whatever he may, or may not have done, and to whom, I'm finding the reporting of this in the media absolutely repulsive. The media wouldn't be able to report it as they are, were the alligations being made at a living person, so I'm not quite sure why even so-called respectible news institutions like the BBC have taken it apon themselves to declaire that they are the law and both try and convict someone a dead person, of a chrime, or series of chrime, without having to take it through the legal system.
With all the media coverage, and its very low style of addressing and considering the alligations, its clear now I'd have thought, that there is no way an independant and successful prosicution could be held, up to the justice of law, without it being unduely influenced by the media's already declaired conviction of the alleged criminal..

>>its very low style of addressing and considering the alligations,

True, some of the most serious allegations are also those which need most consideration. How credible are the ex-patients who claim to have seen Savile openly abusing children on the wards? Were they in a state of medication which might affect their ability to bear witness to such events? Such questions aren't asked.

Exactly.. I also find it odd, that these people who apparently saw such abuse happening 'openly', did not do anything about it at the time. Having spent a great deal of time, as a patient in hospital, I'd also find it hard to believe anything regarding things happening on a ward, unnoticed, due to the constant movement of nurses and doctors and visitors through the hospital, and certainly the only time I've visited a childs ward in a hospital, as a visitor, the level of staffing was even higher than on the adult wards where I was a patient Alligations, for that is all they are at the moment, need to be investigated properly, and appropiately, and the evidence, or otherwise such investigations find, needs to be examined in a considered, logical fashion, such as by the UK legal structures and procedures, everything that has happened so far, in the reporting and conjecturing on these issues, has merely vastly reduced the likelyhood of this being able to happen.
I guess it just means Its OK to do such when the alligations are about someone who's dead.

Some of these allegations have already been judged to have been credible.

Incidents were reported and believed by adults, health Care professionals, social workers and reported to the police.

By virtue of the vulnerability of those reporting pitting them in a she said, he said against Jimmy Savile,it was judged that what he said would win out and that process would cause more damage to an already vulnerable and traumatised person

Time and time again, this seems to have to have happened, children and women spoke out, sometimes these weren't brushed under the carpet and were reported to the proper authorities where they did nothing

'By virtue of the vulnerability of those reporting pitting them in a she said, he said against Jimmy Savile,it was judged that what he said would win out and that process would cause more damage to an already vulnerable and traumatised person'

which to me, says more about the processes, than the credibility of the nature of the reports

"worse (sorry) when one of the participants is supposed to be in loco parentis to the other"

I can see why you'd apologise for that - there are those hysterics who will roundly condemn you for not lumping all vaguely similar activities into a single category without any possibility of nuance. "Rape is rape", while on one level a laudible sentiment, is also self-evidently ludicrously false, just as "assault is assault" would be - I've been assaulted, and the effect on me lasted a day or two, whereas someone of my acquaintance was assaulted and felt unable to leave the house unaccompanied for months. Some self-evidently are worse than others. That doesn't stop the less serious ones being bad, but it acknowledges that there are degrees.

But looked at from a rational, purely societal point of view (i.e. discounting the individual experience of the victim) then yes, it is definitely worse if the perpetrator is in a position of trust. If you were to create a sliding scale of expectation with regard to how much you'd expect to be able to trust someone alone in a room with an attractive fourteen year old girl, you'd put teacher near one end of the scale and a rock star pretty much right at the other, wouldn't you? And frankly, I'd have put Jimmy Savile closer to the Jimmy Page end even before any of the recent hoohaa. Isn't the whole point of the rock star image one of sexual danger? Isn't that how they've been sold for decades? And everyone, male and female, has bought into that enthusiastically since pretty much the sixties, or even before. To turn around decades later and decry it seems a bit, well, stupid. Young men with musical talent were showered with money and left alone in hotel rooms far from home with girls who worshipped them - who's surprised they indulged? Should we blame them for it, given that we're lecturing retrospectively from what to them would be the science-fiction future? Are we looking over our shoulders right now and thinking about what behaviours we're indulging in right now that our children's generation will condemn us for? Feeding them junk food and rubbish television talent shows? Burning oil? Who knows?

Yes 2legsI get what you are saying about the concentration on this specific individual. It would be more helpful if the whole issue of abuse was opened up as something that is not so uncommon in society and the problem being that its mostly done when no-one else is around so its your word against theirs. I've certainly had a few unpleasant experiences when younger, though not under age, but still a form of assault e.g. sudden fondling, men exposing themselves and asking you to touch them, even a GP once suddenly starting to caress me when taking blood pressure. You soon learn not to say anything. They deny it, you're not believed..and you end up feeling worse. Other women have told me similar stories.

Hospitals are a good place for people to operate, and it can be women as much as men. And it'll be on the night shift. If you're sectioned you can't escape, much like prison and of course people can say oh it was the psychosis and the medication talking.

Some well dodgy people choose to work in that environment..a minority of course but you can see how it would attract people. I expect some prisons also draw a few such types. And it can be unpleasant psychological abuse. It's like they oh so caring about you the poor victim, but the moment you show a bit of spirit that they disaprove of ie they are no longer 'controlling' you, they turn on you in a very unpleasant way, and you can't leave and anyway they've sort of groomed you to dependancy. I make a point now if I'm in certain situations of asking the person what has motivated them to choose such a job. That stops them in their tracks but good honest genuine people don't mind the question and understand why you would ask.

Thankfully its a small minority but certain environments and power differentials are a big part of it. You can see how Saville appeared to manipulate his image..mixing with Royalty and Thatcher, having his photo taken with them..and getting involved with all sorts of situations where people were vulnerable. But its best to look at that as a pattern in general. But maybe its a bit threatening for society to really open this up as an issue that can happen in all sorts of complex ways. IMO such people are contemptible inadequates who can't make proper relationships.

Jerry Sadowitz was talking about it in 1987! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJBPTXCRXGs

Well I remember all the furore about Bill Wyman and Mandy Smith.

Not much happened about that..

Maybe it was just a very different attitude then.All the groups were fighting off groupies and one wonders at how old some of them were..

But I still find it amazing that not one word was typed by any of Murdoch's phone hacking,smut finding, bully boy journos.Even they wouldn't be scared of litigation if they had a juicy enough story.

That last point is a pretty excellent one,

I'd forgotten all about Wyman and Smith, although it was of course all over the papers at the time. She was THIRTEEN when he started "dating" her - he was forty seven. And yet despite that being common knowledge, nothing was "done" about it. He of course was married to her when she was 19, having been banging her since she was 14, as she later "revealed". Yeah love, big surprise.

But - and I'm not sure why more isn't being made of this in defence of people who did nothing about Savile - that kind of stuff was clearly happening *all the time*, and even when it WAS common knowledge, nothing was done and there was no public outcry demanding something was done. It was accepted. Oh, it's just Wyman, the old lecher, chasing after underage skirt, he's a card, innee? Pathetic old rocker, mind you, 'ave you seen 'er, I can't say I blame 'im, I mean I would.

I'd forgotten about Bill Wyman too ... not that it specially interested me at the time, as I'm the same age as Mandy Smith (I think) and therefore (a) had no idea who Bill Wyman was and (b) had no real idea what they would have been doing.

It seems the only contemporaneous reference in Private Eye was the merest allusion in a Sylvie Krin 'Heir of Sorrows' in the 1990s.

Husband and I guessed wrong on the radio 1 DJ ... but we weren't guessing for groping.

Mol

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2220413/Jimmy-Savile-How-Savile-abused-sisters-grandchild-His-great-niece-reveals-scandals-sickening-twist--bribed-sister-cover-up.html

I wondered why his family haven't been out defending him, that article gives some insight.

Surprised? No. There was a culture in the 70s and 80s (and presumably before, but my memory can't stretch back that far) that allowed these sort of things to happen, perhaps partly out of the 'no sex please, we're British' attitude of topic avoidance? Adults rarely listened to children. If you took no notice, you didn't have to deal with it. I imagine that's how many people around JS felt too. I suspect these occurrences (involving an adult in an authority position) were much more frequent than will ever be known. Children would most likely be accused of lying, misunderstanding the situtaion or simply told to keep quiet about it, or were liable to keep it to themselves anyway as they would have to live with the consequences if they spoke out. Many victims will remain silent.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/oct/17/jimmy-savile-aide-janet-cope?newsfeed=true

"Jimmy Savile's long-standing former personal assistant has spoken out for the first time about the child abuse scandal, saying the presenter "thought he was untouchable"."

I think that needs to be changed to 'knew he was untouchable'...because evidence points towards the fact he was untouchable; he died without being charged or put in front of a court...result for him...

Compo and media coverage.

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Since I regularly watch BBC and not ITV (adn my radio habits are similar) I am wondering if there is wall to wall coverage on ITV also.

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On the subject of compensation which is bound to become an issue in the near future, I have some concerns about where it comes from.

There appear to be a few bodies that will become liable, mostly the BBC and specific hospitals in the NHS.

Working in the NHS, for a trust that was recently held responsible for a very serious incident, a situation has arisen where 'the trust' has been ordered to pay compensation to injured parties.

Of course, this doesn't hurt 'the trust', all it does is to hamper it's ability to deliver better and safer services. In this case, compensation will be paid to the victims of an incident and the removal of that money from 'the trust' will harm services to people living in the area needing services supporting them with their mental health.

A similar situation will arise with the BBC. Services provided to the rest of us will diminish (to a small degree perhaps) without harming 'the BBC' which is a corporate body.

Is there a better way to deal with this?

PP

Oblige them to broadcast objective news coverage for a week.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-20038794

I suppose it's too much of a leap to suggest the compensation be paid for by Savile's estate?

Here's an idea - if you're awarded compensation against a private company operating in a competitive market and not in receipt of or dependent on public funds, your compo comes from their coffers. Straightforward enough, the only people who suffer are the shareholders.

But if you're awarded compensation by a monopoly *public* body - one funded by taxation of one sort or another - then it's different. Any such body should be required, by law, to have a "board", consisting of, say, the top 5% earners from that organisation, regardless of role. Not *IN* the organisation - all bodies paid by the organisation in any capacity. So for instance Jeremy Clarkson, or Chris Evans, who don't work for the BBC but instead make programmes and sell them to the Beeb, would be for the purposes of assessment considered as employees, and if they're paid enough, they'd be on the board.

In the event of a compo claim of, say, £1million, that sum is divided up pro rata and deducted from that year's payments to the members of the board. That way, EVERYONE who is doing well out of a public body has personal responsibility for its conduct and if it suffers, they suffer, directly. There'd be loopholes and difficulties, obviously, but the principle is, I think, sound. You can bet your house that if their salary was directly at stake, people wouldn't look the other way when situations like the Savile thing started happening. No service provision would be affected because all the comp payment would come out of salaries only, and no single person would be *too* drastically affected because the pain would be shared out across the top earners so no individual was reduced to penury.

The size of the board could even vary according to the size of the comp payment award. Yeah that would work better. You could set a limit on how much of someone's salary could be cut in a given year, say, 20%. So if a comp claim comes in in March, and it's for, say, £200,000, and the top earner in your hospital makes a million pounds a year, that £200k is deducted from their salary, and nobody else suffers. BUT if another comp claim comes in later in the year, they've paid their dues and don't get any more deductions, and the payment comes from the salaries of the next one or two or more people down the salary scale. It would work like a bonus in reverse, and the actual budgets that mattered would never be affected.

It could work...